Average Rating: 6.4/10
Reviews Counted: 150
Fresh: 105 | Rotten: 45
Religulous is funny and offensive in equal measure, and aims less to change hearts and minds than to inspire conversation.
Average Rating: 6/10
Critic Reviews: 34
Fresh: 22 | Rotten: 12
Religulous is funny and offensive in equal measure, and aims less to change hearts and minds than to inspire conversation.
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Average Rating: 3.8/5
User Ratings: 35,511
Borat director Larry Charles follows host Bill Maher as he travels the continents interviewing various subjects about God and religion. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
Sep 6, 2008 Wide
Feb 17, 2009
$13.0M
Lionsgate Films
All Critics (152) | Top Critics (34) | Fresh (109) | Rotten (45) | DVD (6)
Maher is essentially and professionally a comic, and the measure of this movie is not just the thoughts it provokes but the laughs it generates.
I think this is an important movie, challenging, many beliefs that many of us seem unwilling to talk about. Mainly, though, you'll laugh...a lot.
Religulous has an unholy fervor that should start many bonfires.
About half of the movie works in its snide, hit-and-run way. The other half throws more and more darts at the same balloon, long after it pops.
Maher sets out not after answers but cheap laughs that preach, so to speak, to the converted.
Was Maher afraid he might muddy his clownish jape if he actually brought into the mix a learned theologian?
Bill Maher admittedly dresses a one-sided anti-religion diatribe in documentary linens and the hypocrites he finds make great punchlines. But he also addresses the historically proven truth of faith perverted for power and the danger posed to us all.
Rather disconcertingly, the film builds towards a vision of the apocalypse, the destructive fate that religious conflicts have in store for us -- a version of the future any hellfire preacher would be proud of.
Borat/Bruno meets Michael Moore in this funny and thought provoking attack on religion.
So if you are not already on-side with [Maher's] particular leanings, the pickings in Religulous are very slim indeed.
The Passion of the Maher
Instead of confronting real problems radiating from the world's major religions Mr. Maher and Mr. Charles opt for Borat redux, making fun of silly little yokels.
Ever the clever quipper, Bill Maher tackles religious dogma and ritual%u2013and Bibles tales%u2013in this documentary of irreverence. The film is witty and pointedly critical%u2013but it's no revelation.
Ultimately, the movie is an impotent howl into the wind.
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Wants to be a wakeup call in a room where the people are willing to sleep just a little too deeply.
I'm all for a documentary about the mass hysteria of our warring creeds, but stand-up satirist Bill Maher turns out to be the wrong man to make it.
Maher has gone for easy targets. He comes up with the odd funny gag, but you get the feeling that he is as dogmatic about his doubt as the believers are about their faith.
Often funny, frequently unfair, mostly simplistic, at times offensively unethical and ultimately limited.
It was much more thought-provoking than I was expecting, but his blatant bias made me feel that he was no less a fundamentalist than the religious people he was criticising.
Over-extended but nonetheless thought provoking and humorous documentary.
Fortunately for filmgoers, the sight of Bill Maher laying the smacketh down on God is, to quote Homer Simpson, truly "sacrilicious".
Maher crucifies the kooks. What he singularly fails to do, though, is engage with anyone sensible. By mocking the loonies he squanders the precious high ground. A real pity.
Hmm. I was hoping this movie would be better than this. It's more mean-spirited than it is insightful, more smirkingly ironic than genuinely explorative, and tries too hard to be funny at the expense of the faithful to actually change anyone's mind. I'm actually something of an atheism activist myself, so it annoys me
July 13, 2008Super Reviewer
Religulous is more comedy than documentary, it's almost as much of a documentary as Borat was but without the fake characters (excluding the guy who thinks he's Jesus). Anyway, I'm an Atheist, so guess what - I thought it was funny. Bill Maher, a comedian I wasn't familiar with, was preaching to the converted as far as
January 16, 2012Super Reviewer
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